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More paddy, more problems
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While the Government today launches a massive programme to make agriculture free of chemicals, the paddy storage problem has reached boiling point. Thousands of farmers are reaping the Maha harvest, but the tragedy is that large quantities of paddy from the earlier Yala harvest are still in cold storage. Desperate farmers, unable to get a fair price, are selling their paddy to private mill owners at a low rate to meet their basic needs. This scene at Karuwalagaswewa in the Anuradhapura district portrays the plight of tens of thousands of farmers around the country. Pic by Jayaratne Wickremarachchi.